DCTUnited Bargaining Update April 27th, 2017

Update April 27th, 2017

In this edition: Agree To Disagree This week in bargaining…
This week in bargaining, your DCTU bargaining team and the City got closer to signing a Tentative Agreement (TA) on some cleanup of the confusing language about holidays in Article 15 in the current contract. We also agreed in principle with City representatives that the City should not work to recoup overpayments if the cost of recoupment exceeds the amount of the overpayment. It is common for multiple, well-paid City staffers to have to research and then process recoupments for very small amounts of money, sometimes measured in cents. In our opinion this is a waste of City resources. However, we were unable to reach a TA with the City on this issue. We continue to disagree with the City on the punitive 90/10 healthcare split they have proposed. We are holding fast to our position that 95/5 is a fair split, and that if the City wants to incentivize better health, it could do so by decreasing the employee contribution amount if the employee exhibits the behavior desired by the City. Part of our suspicion of the City’s proposal is that they have repeatedly said, and continue to say, that this is not “the camel’s nose under the tent”, which makes us think that it may in fact be the camel’s nose under the tent. In addition, this week, Maureen Weber, one of the City’s chief negotiators, explained that if the City wanted to increase employee health care premiums costs in the future, that we would need to bargain “All The Things”. This week, members of our team were also gave presentations to advocate for selective increases for Facilities Maintenance Technicians, Electricians and Housing Inspectors. There were some questions from the City team. In particular, Deborah Sievert-Morris from the Bureau of Development Services complemented member Steve Kass, a Housing Inspector on the thoroughness of his presentation. Overall, the presentations were well received.

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AFSCME’s 1.6 million members provide the vital services that make America happen. With members in hundreds of different occupations — from public safety to water treatment, building inspection to neighborhood involvement — AFSCME advocates for fairness in the workplace, excellence in public services and prosperity and opportunity for all working families.
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